Highlights

Chocolate Grinder Mix 92The Mario Coin Mix

Last year, I posted a mix of 10 songs that sample the sound of a gun cocking (you know, that “chk chk” sound), but it was terribly timed: it coincided with the day of the Dark Knight shooting. While I’ve already collected enough gun-cock tracks to do a couple more this year, I’ve decided to challenge myself instead with an even more obscure sample: that cute, chimey little sound effect heard when Mario, ever the capitalist, grabs a coin.

First off, I love that sound (who doesn’t?) — not only for nostalgic reasons but also because, in the context of the sampling world of electronic-based musics, it now vaguely signifies achievement, using a simple two-note melody (B to G) that can be easily appropriated for both its cultural resonance and its harmonic potential.

Second, I just barely found enough songs to constitute a mix. There were 8-bit tracks and joke-y songs that I could’ve included, but I wanted a mix that I’d actually listen to. In fact, I cut out this $yrup remix track at the 11th hour because it was so annoying to hear on repeat. Luckily, the rest I genuinely do enjoy, and I think they all make great use of the Mario coin: the classic version can be heard on tracks by Sugar C, Paisley Parks, and Tedy, and the newer version on a track by Co La. It’s pitched down on “Coins For The Canopy” by Maximillion Dunbar, one of two artists (the other being Paisley Parks) who use the coin to signify its monetary nature, and it’s so heavily effected by Huerco S. and Quiet Evenings that I’m not even sure they’re sampling it (update: neither are).

But my two favorite uses of the Mario coin come at the end of the mix, where TONY FERARRI (a.k.a. SP wiz aaronmaxwell) has the audacity to chop the coin mid-sample and where Lil B, like on the gun-cock mix, concludes the mix with a humorously absurd, surreal deployment.

“End Games”

Man, oh man, it’s been a great few weeks for videos. First came Oneohtrix Point Never’s amazing (and sadly temporarily non-existent) collaborative techno-erotic exploration with Jon Rafman. Next came Tim Hecker’s exquisitely warped and washed-out gothic video for “Black Refraction,” a track from his forthcoming album Virgins. Now, viewers are presented with this little bit of genius from Brisbane’s Sky Needle.

So simple and yet so totally intense and absolutely effective, like some sort of primitive psychedelia, build, build, building to its demented Dionysian climax.

ME AH BOY THE STAR OF THE HEAD BORN A STAR YOU THAT STYLE THE FLOOR FLAWED WE ARE VILE THE GASSED OF DOOR PLAN BORED IS BY THE WAR RYE KNOW EYE WE ARE BY THE GUEST OF THE HEAD BORE A PIE THE BOAR HIGH RISE HORSE BEER OR MILES THROUGH OUT THE N I G H T BUY BILE STARTS SKY ONE WHY WHALES BE BEE OUT SIDE WALK THE…

And what are these words now but squawks of sound and passion: phlegm, lungs, loud, wind, whine, throat, thrust?

(UNINTELLIGIBLE) WE ARE SO HOT SO SOLAR…

In promotion of their latest album, Debased Shapes (out NOW on Bruit Direct Disques), Sky Needle just finished a European tour alongside Melbourne skuzz-rock act Mad Nanna. If you dig Debased Shapes, make sure you check out 2012’s Rave Cave. It’s similarly fucked up, but in the best possible way, of course.

Pictures Of Men. [excerpt]

One may not immediately associate emotional noise music with the unaltered sounds of pigs and geese, but the first five and a half minutes of Patrick Farmer and David Lacey’s Pictures Of Men. does a lot to make that connection much more apparent. The unaffected agricultural recordings that open the album are among the more gutturally moving musical moments I’ve heard this year. There’s something about the unidentified squawking and oinking that immediately registers as “pained,” in the same manner that a black metal vocalist’s yelps signify despair despite the incomprehensibility of their words. However, with the case of black metal, a listener can always look at the lyric sheet and see the source of the singer’s pain. Pictures Of Men. requires close listens to reveal the origins of certain sounds.

Throughout these opening minutes, it’s easy to hear some kind of industrial clangor that could be the source of the animals’ distress, and it’s pretty much a given that the producer of that clangor must be human. In that case, it seems that Farmer and Lacey use the opening material to establish a subtle dichotomy between man and nature that continues throughout the duration of the 45-minute composition.

As Pictures Of Men. progresses, this dichotomy between the natural-sound world and the man-made world is explored through the juxtaposition of field recording and EAI performance. It’s often difficult to tell what’s a natural sonic occurrence and what’s the result of the duo’s extended percussion technique. As the timbral textures eventually move from farmland to factory, it becomes clear that the album’s opening material presents an unedited relationship between human technology and nature that informs the rest of work. As a result, Pictures Of Men. is an amazingly thorough composition that raises interesting questions about sound source while managing to warp its own sounds into an arresting piece of music.

“Hadouken” (ft. Keke The Adopted Tabby Cat)

Lil B has released three mixtapes this year — 100% Percent Gutta, Pink Flame, and P.Y.T. (Pretty Young Thug) — and a shit-ton of music videos lately, many of them hyping up his long-delayed mixtape, 05 Fuck Em (which is said to have grown to 70 songs across 5 “discs”). Today, however, we’re treated to something different: a weird (of course!) new BASED FREESTYLE track called “Hadouken,” a dedication of sorts to Ryu and Ken’s fireball projectile in the Street Fighter video game. The best part? The track features Keke “The Adopted Tabby Cat,” who had us all doing some BASED MEOWING last year with this genuinely bizarre song.

But wait, that’s not the best part at all. According to the video, Keke “The Adopted Tabby Cat” will soon be releasing a whole album, produced by Lil B himself. I really hope that’s not a joke.

“Envelopment” / “Melting”

Last Mother’s Day, my family and I were heading to Carmine’s in the heart of NYC. A few blocks away, my mom points to the InterContinental Hotel and says, “That place is famous.” As we approach the hotel, there’s a mob of people everywhere, so naturally we muscle our way through. My fiancée trailed within our wake and yells, “Monster, I think you just shoved a celebrity!” Looking back, my first thought as I see Drake glaring at me was that part from Degrassi, but I only squeaked out, “Hi.” Had it been composer and ZS guitarist Patrick Higgins, I’d have geeked out, even though we‘ve met on several occasions.

But check it out: Higgins is poppin’ out a deluxe double LP this year, and it consists of work he wrote for Mivos Quartet, titled String Quartet No.2 (a group he’s very familiar working with), and a “remix” of his work called Glacia — LPs I’ve been waiting to spin since day one (for me). The album comes at listeners as a joint effort between Words+Dreams and new label Ex Cathedra Records, distributed exclusively by Redeye Distribution and available November 12 on CD, digital, and (of course) double tri-color splattered vinyls limited to 300 copies.

Can’t wait that long? You’re in LUCK! If you’re livin’ in NYC travel distance, Le Poisson Rouge will present a special album release concert on October 4 with Mivos Quartet, Buke + Gase, and Higgins’ quadraphonic surround-sound set beginning at 6 PM. Tickets are available hereAND advance copies of the record will be available at the show!!!!!!!!!!!

Old

Let’s get something straight: XXX was a great album, a complicated album, a psychedelic meditation on survival and excess, at turns (and sometimes simultaneously) a celebration and a lamentation. It was followed by a long string of strictly celebratory interviews, EPs, and guest verses — a blatant brand-building exercise that succeeded more in caricaturization than characterization.

Asian.

Old is the follow up that XXX deserved. A dichotomization and a hybridization, it’s anything but a boring sequel and far stronger than its first singles “Dip” and “Kush Coma” would have you believe.

Flomax (stream Old) below via Spotify, pre-order on iTunes, or if you yourself are an old person, you can wait until October 8 for the physical copies, assuming of course you don’t die first.